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scottsjack

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Aug 25, 2010
1,906
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Arizona
Did it but just couldn't live with it.

A couple of months ago I sold my 2010 MP 3.2 quad, 24GB, 5870. I just got tired of "old", whatever that means and was not having good luck with USB3. It was time to join a more modern USB3/TB world.

I replaced the MP with with a 2012 mini 2.6 i7, 16GB and installed the 960GB M500 from the MP. For storage I bought an OWC Thunderbay 4 and put the MP's four HDDs in it.

That was really an excellent hardware combination assuming I did not try to do too much heavy duty stuff all at the same time. I could recommend that setup to just about anyone and since I'll probably be selling the mini and Thunderbay I definitely will be recommending it.:)

The problem was it wasn't a Mac Pro. I just bought a really clean, true 2012 in stock condition, i.e. 3.2 quad, 6GB, 5770. It definitely needs RAM, a CPU and a GPU but it feels great to have that stupidly huge hunk of aluminum back on my desk. The M500 went back into a MP and after entering a few passwords I'm back in the saddle.

Sure the Geekbench 3 scores suck but it seems to work better than the mini. Compared to the Intel HD 4000 the AMD HD 5770 isn't too shabby either!
 
Verdenshersker said:
Welcome back on the "big market" :)

Are you going for Dual CPU board or "just" a big 6 core?

Tell us about your plans and what you're gonna use it for :)
Click to expand...

Not all the much really. Light Photoshop work, a little Aperture, EyeTV and a lot of fiddling around. Last night I did a couple Canon 5Dm3 three-frame HDRs without remembering that the poor beast only has 6GB RAM. It worked just fine.

I do want to get a six-core though. There are apparently plenty of used 3.33s and 3.46s on the market.
 
scottsjack said:
Not all the much really. Light Photoshop work, a little Aperture, EyeTV and a lot of fiddling around. Last night I did a couple Canon 5Dm3 three-frame HDRs without remembering that the poor beast only has 6GB RAM. It worked just fine.

I do want to get a six-core though. There are apparently plenty of used 3.33s and 3.46s on the market.
Click to expand...

Ahhh so the plan is 12-16 GB memory? Assuming you are not going crazy with work :) Myself I have 32 GB in my 2009. Yeah there is a bunch of those on the market - I look at them when I wanted to upgrade from my 2.26 Ghz, but I went with 2.93 Ghz Quad Cores - so it doesn't sound like a huge upgrade but the speed difference is huge... And the cost was $75 for both incl. shipping... So a fairly affordable too
 
Verdenshersker said:
Ahhh so the plan is 12-16 GB memory? Assuming you are not going crazy with work :) Myself I have 32 GB in my 2009. Yeah there is a bunch of those on the market - I look at them when I wanted to upgrade from my 2.26 Ghz, but I went with 2.93 Ghz Quad Cores - so it doesn't sound like a huge upgrade but the speed difference is huge... And the cost was $75 for both incl. shipping... So a fairly affordable too
Click to expand...

I'll probably go with 24GB of OWC memory. That's what I had on the last one and it worked out pretty good.
 
Verdenshersker said:
Gotcha...

Can you tell a lot different if you are running triple or dual channel?

I mean, I would rather have 4 x 8 GB (32 GB) than the 24 GB kit
Click to expand...

It's only worth going for 2 or four sticks if you are going to use a lot more memory. 64GB for example. That's when you won't care if you aren't runnin triple channels.
 
EdDuPlessis said:
It's only worth going for 2 or four sticks if you are going to use a lot more memory. 64GB for example. That's when you won't care if you aren't runnin triple channels.
Click to expand...

Ahh I see, so 24 GB Triple Channel will be better than 32 GB Dual Channel?

I have 32 GB (8x4GB) in mine, but that is the dual CPU - so is that a difference?
 
It doesn't drop to dual channel with more sticks added. It's still 3 channel but bandwidth is shared on the 3rd channel amongst the added memory.

For example, on a single CPU machine, slots 1-3 are on independent channels, if you put memory in slot 4, that stick will share bandwidth with slot 3.
 
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